Posted on 01/13/2010 7:08:20 PM PST by SeekAndFind
He may be a crank, but he’s consistent in his crankery. Anywhere there’s human misery — after 9/11, after Katrina, even after Ariel Sharon’s stroke — Reverend Pat will be there to explain to the victims why they deserved it. (And he’s not the only one.) He’s taking a beating on Twitter right now for having said this, including/especially from Christians who don’t want to see the faith smeared by his latest Old Testament thunderbolt theory. No worries there: Other Christian leaders, starting with the Pope and Franklin Graham, are taking a more New Testament view. But even conceding that he doesn’t speak for most Christians, he does still command a sizable following, no? Even after years of barfing up stuff like this.
If you’re wondering what the “pact with the devil” is all about (fact check: roughly 95 percent of Haitians are Christian), Tapper has some quickie background. Tongue-in-cheek exit question from MKH: According to the Harry Reid standard, shouldn’t Robertson’s charitable works absolve him from any and all offensive utterances?
Read the article from 2004 but I see that some on this thread are disputing the fact. If it’s true, then what Pat Robertson says cannot be discounted.
I would like to make a small point here. There were just as many or more who not only helped themselves by tearing down and rebuilding or gutting and rehabilitating their homes and other properties, but who went out of their way to give abundant hugs, meals, shelter, as well as verbal "thank yous" etc. to those who took the time out from their own lives to help us put ours back together. They will never be forgotten.
Not everyone or everything that has to do with New Orleans is lazy, ungrateful, debauched or evil. As a native who falls into none of the above categories, it's tiresome reading nothing but the negative.
You are a very enlightened person my friend!
“If it’s true, then what Pat Robertson says cannot be discounted.’
If what’s true, that an entire nation made a pact with the bogie man and are, therefore, to blame for an earthquake?
Got it in one. God's progressive revelation.
No wonder after two thousand years of following the first hippie western civilization is in such a mess.
That would be the western civilisation whose technology and social advancement soared above every other culture on the planet, and spread its ideals, idealogy and values to every corner of the globe? The one that embraced Christianity, right?
So . . . if the "old testament" is so meeeean, why are Jews so liberal?
Because they're @^%$&$ stupid and bite the hand that feeds them?
I was speaking of the first days of Katrina and those who wouldn’t leave but could have. They stood and sat on bridges and overpasses in 90 degree weather complaining about not having had a hot meal for 3 days. Instead of organizing and building an outdoor latrine and policing it themselves for safety issues, they defecated where they slept and ate inside the Superdome. Those sent to Houston and other places also sat and were waited on instead of pitching in and serving food, working clean-up and keeping kids under control and amused. They looted, robbed, threatened, raped and terrorized people. Those who rebuilt are a different breed of cat that the people I’m speaking of. The ones I’m speaking of took government checks and stayed in motels for a year or more, used financial respurces they were given to set themselves up in a new home/apartment to buy bling and drugs, and so on. First came the complaints and demands about being taken care of, then came the theft, fraud and misuse of funds.
For the first time in my adult life, I was ashamed to be an American.
I'm not so sure that God's wrath works in the way that some people on this thread describe. The downside of stating that every natural disaster that occurs is a result of the iniquity of a person, or a community, or even a nation, is that by implication every misfortune that afflicts you must therefore be a result of God's wrath against your sinful life. This is the dark side of the "prosperity gospel" idea. By this theory, Sarah Palin gave birth to a disabled child, that must be because God's judgement of some sin in her life. Palpable nonsense of course. In fact, Jesus condemns such attitudes when he healed the blind man, and the leper. God may very well punish the wicked in this way, but it's not for us to assume that He has.
The Bible passages that best apply here are "Everything is permissable, but not everything is beneficial" (1 Cor 10:23) which is a poetic way of saying that God, in His wisdom, lets us do anything we want, even that which is not good for us. And freedom, after all, is what we all want, not so?
The other passage is "A man reaps what he sows" (Galatians 6:7), which is a very poetic way of saying there are consequences to our actions. If we, as a society, choose to allow (or even revere) adultery, promiscuity and homosexuality, then we can do that. God will allow it. But the consequences will be a decrease in the birth rate, an increase in the frequency of STD's, an increasing number of marriage breakdowns, an increasing number of unhappy children drifting between isolated parents and not getting the instruction they need, and so on. All of which will cause even more problems for the next generation.
Can you see what I am getting at? I think God does not so much punish us directly, but instead lets us "punish" ourselves, both as individuals and as a collective body, by allowing us to experience the consequences of our behaviour. And after all, if we refuse to do what He reccomends, and follow our own imperfect desires and ambitions, we can hardly complain when we get very imperfect results.
Settle down, FRiend. By now, there isn’t a soul on this site who doesn’t know one simple rule: Ignore whatever the media say. Do your own checking, your own research, get the real facts, THEN draw a conclusion.
Let's be brutally honest here: In the view of people like Robertson, "Papists" are not real Christians (but he's too chicken-$#!^ to say so outright).
I like your summary. I think that Pat is wrong in saying that....linking a singular event (earthquake) with a pagan (devil worship) religion. Over the course of time, natural disasters happen everywhere and happen to good people and communitites not known for bad behavior like voo-doo.
However, Voo doo has been dominant in Haiti for over 200 years. OVER THE LONG TERM, this has been devastating to the people of Haiti compared to other countries in that region that did not embrace voo doo.
In the days of the old testament, people and nations were under the law and Godly judgement could be swift and sudden for behavior (Sodom and Gohorrah, the Great Flood, etc.). We now live in the age of grace (new testament) where Godly judgement has been restrainted due to Christ but judgement will come back during the tribulation.
This, does not mean that we are free from behavior and its consequences. Haiti HAS been suffering from its embrace with voo doo for over 200 years now. No sudden and singular event like an earthquake 200 years later simply mean that God is judging Haiti. Consequences of sin like poverty, the destruction of the family, stds (AIDS origins was traced to Haiti), economic despair, and dictarships are just some of the things that Haitians have destowed on themselves as a result of voo doo OVER the years.
For example, take and individual living here in the US. If he/she experienced a singular loss like a house fire, does that automatically mean that he/she is living in sin and God is judging him/her? I think not but Pat would tend to think that it is. Now if this same individual lived a life of sin (drug use, prostitution, crime, etc.), by the end of his life, you would see very large differences in terms of things like (health, friends, wealth, attitude, etc.) when compared to another individual not living a life of rampant sin. Sin’s consequences are incremental but noticable in this life....this bears witness for us to avoid it. Sin however, has eternal consequences. The great news is that Jesus died for our sins and those consequences are done away with if we trust in Him.
You don’t actually read the Bible, do you? Judging from the nonsense you and other people are attributing to It in this thread, one would think not.
First, Jesus did come to judge, the living and the dead. He told one man he healed to stop sinning or something worse would happen to him. He told lots of people to stop sinning after judging that what they were doing was wrong. He called out entire cities and compared some of them to Sodom and Gomorrah.
And this “God of the Old Testament” stuff is nothing but recycled ancient anti-Semitism. The story of Ananias and Saphirra is told in the Book of the Acts of the Apostles, and happened after Jesus died on the Cross.
Empty headed cheap grace is not Biblical. Paul, who did even greater healing miracles than Jesus, told us that we are to judge our brethren.
I heard Robertson’s comments - he speculated on whether the Haitians had incurred wrath (which, if you believe the “New” Testament, is what you do when you refuse Jesus’ offer to take what God pours out), and looked at this as an opportunity for Haitians to rebuild their society, both spiritually and materially (which is what mature Christians do when faced with catastrophe).
Both of my pastors and one of my Emmaus pilgrims is in Haiti right now. They were there when the earthquake happened. Robertson ignores the fact that God sends people, not calamities.
You are correct, naturalized. We find both Grace and Condemnation in both the old and new Testiments. Nineveh found grace because the people of Nineveh repented. Sodom and Gomorrah would have found grace if there had been just 10 righteous souls there.
God is just. God is righteous. God is graceous. God is loving. True throughout the Bible. Even in the books that are left out of the protestant Bibles.
ping for later
ping for later
I am proud to call myself a Christian, but I am reminded not to elevate myself to being judgemental. Pat should, too.
I am proud to call myself a Christian, but I am reminded not to elevate myself to being judgemental. Pat should, too.
Of course irony abounds in this whole satire, given the fact that Voodoo that blend of animism and Xianity is the dominant religion of that disaster zone. I personally blame it on lack of belief in animal sacrifice or chanting not done right.
Questions:
Let’s say a group of people made a pact with the devil two hundred years ago. They’re all dead. Why punish people today? They were not a party to such a pact.
Is that how pacts with the devil work? One of your ancestors made such a pact a thousand years ago and now in 2010 your screwed?
If God is punishing the Haitians would you get in trouble with God for donating money? I mean if God wants to punish people should you lessen the punishment or step back and let Him have at them?
I heard someone say that a human being trying to understanding the mind of God is like an ant trying to understand a television set. Is Pat Robertson a some kind of super ant?
Uh, right. Shut up, Pat.
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